Market Intelligence for Innovation & Product Life-Cycle – Case Examples
The case companies featured in this White Paper are Pirelli Tyre, DSM, and Boehringer Ingelheim. Operating in the car tyre, life and material sciences and pharmaceuticals industries, respectively, all of these companies depend a lot on the quality of their innovation activity and product life-cycle management. Consequently, the related intelligence activities also play a vital role in contributing to the companies’ competitive success.
This White Paper moves forward on the GIA White Paper 4/2007: Market Intelligence for Innovation and Product Life-Cycle Management that discussed the types of Market Intelligence that innovation activity and product development processes typically require.
Pirelli Tyre
Interviewed for this case article was dr. Giorgia Sgalari, manager of competitive analysis & open innovation at Pirelli Tyre. Giorgia Sgalari earned her Ph.D in Chemical Engineering in the University of California Santa Barbara. She then held a post-doctoral position in the group of Biophysics and Complex Systems of the Vrije Unversiteit, Amsterdam before serving as External Consultant for Unilever Research Laboratories, focusing on nanotechnology. In March 2003, Sgalari joined Pirelli Tyre as as Competitive Analyst and worked in the following years also as Manager for IP Issues & Open Innovations.
DSM
Interviewed for this case article was Mr. Ubald Kragten, Manager, Business & Market Intelligence in the DSM Innovation Center. Ubald Kragten has held a number of different positions at DSM, such as Technology Manager and Technology Portfolio Manager before taking responsibility of the company’s intelligence operations. Kragten’s educational background is in chemistry.
Boehringer Ingelheim
Interviewed for this case article was Richard Chizzonite, Executive director (retired), Global licensing, cardiovascular & infl ammatory diseases. Dr. Richard Chizzonite joined Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals (BIPI) in 1998 in Ridgefi eld, CT, USA and assumed the position as head of the Ridgefi eld R&D Global Licensing group in 2001. In that capacity, his group was responsible for the Boehringer Ingelheim global licensing eff orts in the cardiovascular and chronic infl ammatory diseases indications. His group also was responsible for enabling technology licensing for the Ridgefi eld R&D organization.
Biomimicry
The case examples discussed in this article present some innovative ways in which companies have used nature as a source of inspiration for product development. The method is referred to as biomimicry, and it’s literally about mimicking nature’s best practices in the game of “survival of the fittest”.
The Global Intelligence Alliance (GIA) is a global network of business research and Competitive Intelligence (CI) consulting companies. The series of GIA White Papers is a means for the GIA and its clients and partner companies to share knowledge on key topics within the field of Competitive Intelligence. Please feel free to give us feedback on the White Papers by sending email to info@globalintelligence.com.